Once in a blue moon swim

ONCE IN A BLUE MOON...

LOST founder Rob has mentioned a moon-lit swim for awhile, so when we realized there was going to be a full moon on August 31st we thought we might be able to organize a LOST night swim event, but with the busy month August has been we didn't have time and instead very last minute (and by last minute, I mean that morning) a few of us encouraged by Madhu decided to meet at Coronation at 8:30pm as sort of trial swim for making it a LOST night swim event in the future.  Even last minute, we managed to get 4 trustee kayakers, Bill, Mike, Jillian and Rob to watch over us swimming in the dark, or as it turned out, to watch us shiver.

before our dip

wetsuit required

The night was beautiful, the water was crisp  (55F).  We put on glow bracelets, which I wore for all my night training and during my crossing and found it lots of fun to watch the glowing tracks your arm strokes make through the dark water.  Now I've done night swimming before, but always as the only swimmer and my own personal kayaker, so this group night swimming would be a new thing.  Thankfully we were a group because the water was quite cold, even in my sleeveless wetsuit I still thought it was cold and probably would have passed on going in without the group.  We wadded in and then kind of froze, literally, no one wanted to commit to going all the way in.  We buried our feet in the sand to keep them a little warmer.  Or did some water aerobics.

a good kayaker sharing his beverage
(Geoff is shocked or frozen?)

Then Rob egged us on by kayaking away abit and saying just swim out to me and back.  Geoff and I took the bait and started swimming.  Rob of course kept moving further and further...(who would have suspected that??!)  He had a head lamp on but facing the other way so when I would come up to spot for him it took a little while to find him in the dark.  I could make out the shape of the shore, thanks to the moon light, but it was a little different not having the light of a kayak right beside you.  And then all of the sudden I saw Geoff's glowstick arm right beside me, freaked me out a bit momentarily.  Geoff and I swum for about a half hour.  And amazingly although I believe no one else really swam, the others were still standing around in the frigid water when we returned.

we did it, once in a blue moon

Once I was done swimming I started shivering.  So we quickly gathered for a couple pictures in the water and scappered out and had a little more socializing on the beach warming up (warm socializing is a plus)
So the full moon swim was a success.  And hopefully we can get this organized for an annual LOST event each year, so the once in a blue moon swim won't be as rare as it may sound.
Well I also learned something about the term once in a blue moon.  Folklore has named the 2nd full moon in a month a blue moon.  The first one in Aug 2012 was Aug 1st, so this one on Aug 31, 2012 was in fact what they call a "blue moon".  The last time there was a blue moon like this was in 2009 and it won't happen again until 2015.  The things you can learn from swimming...